Datsik & Friends Rage With Charlotte (Concert Review!)

DATSIK And His Crew Bring Down The House:

A few Friday Nights ago, the 11th of April to be exact (yikes) was definitely one for the books, if you weren’t at the Fillmore to catch Datsik and his electronic music buddies feed out bass filled tracks to your typical rowdy Charlotte crowd, then don’t worry, we’ve got you covered.

Let me start off by apologizing to Firepower Record’s Infuze (@Infuzemusic). Events that can’t be mentioned in this blog post held me back from showing up on time. But I’m sure Infuze kept the crowd entertained with his “bass-heavy” style, especially if he played anything like his new track with Proper Villains, Galaxia, or the unforgettable 2014 classic, Release Yourself.

Even though I was bummed out for missing Infuze, I’m glad I made it in time to catch the funky, ganja friendly, gritty, groovy set that I was looking forward to all day, because how often do we really get the chance to see a real live bear dj? “Hailing from Yosemite National Park” as his bio on Firepowerrecords.com displays, Bear Grillz somehow found himself on a stage in Charlotte, North Carolina, so what does a bear do when given a set of turntables and a MacBook? Make college girls twerk of course.

Sporting his new uh… new fur, Bear Grillz held it down and kept the crowd entertained with tracks from his debut, The High Grade EP, on Datsik’s Firepower Records label, one of these hits is called Demons. If you’ve gone to any rave in the past year, you’ve probably heard this gem.

A few other big tracks that Bear Grillz played included most of his new EP, The Unbearable EP, released back in January. I swear I remember seeing a guy spark up his lighter when Bear dropped his Rastafari anthem, Praise It. Add this to next years 4/20 playlist. If you’re a giant Bear Grillz fan and you’re dying to know what else he performed, I’ll tell you!Shark Attack (It was frightening believe me), Drop That Low (The crowd got sexy for this one), and Its F****ng Dubstep, (Don’t get me started)… All I have to say is the real live bear, absolutely not the man in a bear suit, did a great job at getting the Charlotte Crowd hyped up, but we still say #F**KBearGrillz.

I went outside to take a breather and recover from the intense set that I had just experienced, and then I remembered that Los Angeles Moombahtom/Trap/AnythingHef**ckingWants producer & DJ, ETC! ETC!, was about to perform.

Jose Guerrero aka, ETC! ETC! is known for producing a variety of genres, many times creating new sounds when collaborating with big name producers and DJs like Diplo, Ookay, Major Lazer and Brillz, along with all sorts of remixes that will blow your mind, like this one

His unique set consisted of all different types of electronic music; ETC! ETC! performed one of his trap hits, High which seems to have a slight Keys n Krates influence to it, which makes the song that much doper.

(Check Out This Crazy Crowd)

The man behind the blue and red internet robot head (google him!) also decided to play a dope collab with world renowned Mad Decent electronic group, Major Lazer, who are highly recognized for their tendency to cross stream many different types of funky, reggae, electro-house, trap inspired beats, which is awesome! This collab goes by the name of Come On To Mefeaturing the one and only Sean Paul.

The crowd got really excited when the stage crew lowered the giant bed-sheet looking screen and revealed the one and only Vortex 3.0 powered by V Squared Labs. It was amazing to see ETC! ETC! have little zombies pop in and out of the Vortex, but I was definitely ready and amped to see the DJ that I’ve been rockin’ with since I was fifteen, the one and only Datsik. Hats off to ETC! ETC! I know Charlotte is looking forward to his return.

Datsik, a stage name originally inspired by his Xbox Live gamertag, last appeared in Charlotte on Halloween 2013. I strictly remember this because I have a poster in my room reminding me of how I wasn’t able to go that night because none of my older friends with cars felt like going. Worst of all, I missed out on the peculiar but grimy and super f***ing hype Circus Records producer from Bournemouth UK named FuntCase. I know, public transportation was definitely an option, how lazy of me. So you can say I was more than ready for Datsik to hit the stage on his Ninja Nation Tour, and play of that robotic sh*t that really drew me into the world of dubstep to begin with.I’ll try my best to accurately distinguish all the wub wubs that Datsik played that night. I was given the opportunity to take a few close-up shots of Datsik, as well as the other artists mentioned above to complement this review. Well, everyone except for Infuze sorry, again 🙁 Let’s get this out on the table, this was my first time trying to “professionally shoot” a concert, so I definitely spent a little bit of time switching knobs and zooming in and out, and what have you. But it was a blast.

A dope track from 2009 known as Game Over. that was made with Circus Records co-founder, Flux Pavilion, always has me bangin’ my head every time it pops up on shuffle play. The live version was 10x better, something about watching a bunch of people rage just as hard as you is just so refreshing. The bone crushing bass provided by PK Sounds only made me feel like the Game was not, in fact over, but just getting started. The Canadian wobble god played other bass filled hits like Nuke Em, Galvanize, and while I’m not entirely sure, I feel like he was playing his collab with Z-Trip, Double Trouble, as this kid was getting his face melted off.

After 10 minutes of running around the front of the stage trying to get the best shots that I possibly could, (there are so many settings, all this stuff about aperture and ISO, I really oughta read the manual), I walked away and joined the rest of the crowd to witness one of the coolest dubstep shows of 2015. While Datsik’s homie and long time accomplice in electronic music, EXICISON, had just played the Fillmore a few prior to this show, Charlotte is always ready for the next big thing to come to town, and for the rest of that Friday night it became all about Firepower Records, The Vortex 3.0, Datsik, and sexy raver chicks that kept asking me to take their picture.

If you’ve been following Datsik for a while, you’ve probably heard his hit, Oxygen. This is that sh*t that people head bang to even while walking to the bathroom. Another sweet tune that was played off the Let It Burn 2 EP, was, well Let It Burn itself, where Datsik manages to blend a grimey beat with soft female vocals. And who can forget the ninja themed song off Datsik’s newest EP, Down 4 My Ninjas, featuring electronic music vocalist/rapper Mayor Apeshit.

I don’t want to drown you with too many details, but I will say this: Overall the show was more than great. The Fillmore always proves to be a dope venue for larger scale electronic music shows. The ambiance was great, the visuals, done by one of the tour crew members named Morgan, were amazing, so I suppose he’s with V Squared Labs?; the merch table manned down by Mike the Merch Guy aka Mike the Birthday Boy, featured plenty of cool shirts for an affordable price, I actually bought some Datsik stickers and a shirt. If only Bear Grillz had stickers (Hint Hint BG) of his logo, his bear smokin’ a J wearing a rasta hat, and his bear wearing a BG chain standing next to his duck friend, then maybe I would have shelled out another few bucks. ETC! ETC! Also had shirts with a cool image of a zombie with a crown. Until next time, Charlotte!

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Originally from Greensboro, North Carolina, Zyven took his journeys over to Charlotte to expand and grow. After a few months of involvement with the radio station at UNC Charlotte, he decided to turn what once was a radio show, into what would eventually be the largest EDM & Dubstep blog in Charlotte.
If he's not writing a review of a random show on the East Coast, he's taking photos at a music festival, within reach of course. His ventures have taken him to festivals and shows in Miami, Austin Texas, New Orleans, Baltimore, Providence Rhode Island, Chicago and many many more cities.
When in doubt, think of your future millionaire self -- then keep pushing forward.